Working The World At Home

Saint Petersburg Times:

Dial up Continental Airlines to book a flight and you might end up talking to Marla Rothstein, shoeless and sans makeup, in one of the thousands of beige stucco houses in Pasco County’s Meadow Pointe development.

That’s a good thing. Good for Marla, good for Continental and good for you, too.

Airlines can struggle to find and keep good agents. Pay usually starts around $9 an hour. Taking call after call from sometimes abusive customers grates on even the sunniest personalities.

A few carriers now offer an inexpensive perk perhaps as alluring as the free travel privileges: the choice to work at home instead of commuting to a cavernous call center.

Continental started a year ago with 46 employees in Houston. Now 800 agents nationwide, more than 200 in the Tampa Bay area, answer customer calls from home. That’s one in five of Continental’s U.S. agents.

Rothstein was the first to sign up when Continental asked for volunteers to do the job from home. She already had an office with a PC and broadband service. Continental required a second phone line to connect to the reservations data system.

Employees with kids at home, barking dogs or squawking parrots must be able to turn off the noise. American requires that an adult or responsible child oversee younger kids during an agent’s shift.